Space News

Miami -
John Glenn's passing on Thursday means that the first seven American astronauts chosen to lead the fledging US space program in 1959 are now dead, ending a groundbreaking chapter in American history.

Christchurch -
Retired US astronaut and the second man to walk on the moon, Buzz Aldrin, was recovering after his medical evacuation from Antarctica but is not yet able to return home, his manager Christina Korp said Sunday.

Christchurch -
Retired US astronaut and the second man to walk on the moon, Buzz Aldrin, was recovering after his medical evacuation from Antarctica but is not yet able to return home, his manager Christina Korp said Sunday.

Christchurch -
Retired US astronaut and the second man to walk on the moon, Buzz Aldrin, was recovering after his medical evacuation from Antarctica but is not yet able to return home, his manager Christina Korp said Sunday.

A review of data, relating to the summer of 2015, suggests a solar storm struck the Earth’s magnetic field. This unprecedented event lasted a couple of hours, and it could have shrunk the Earth’s magnetosphere.

Paris -
A tiny lander that crashed on Mars last month flew into the Red Planet at 540 kilometres (335 miles) per hour instead of gently gliding to a stop, after a computer misjudged its altitude, scientists said.

Houston -
It may seem like the plot of a sci-fi disaster movie, but NASA scientists have given serious consideration of how the Earth should defend itself against an asteroid should such a space rock be on a collision course with our planet.

Baikonur -
A trio of astronauts soared into orbit Friday bound for the International Space Station, with their Soyuz spacecraft delivering some fancy French food, a saxophone and the future female commander.

Deep space missions will carry risks to the health of astronauts and research is underway to examine risk factors like radiation, developing brittle bones and psychological effects. Also included in the mix are infections.

Houston -
The number of moons around Uranus is a matter of scientific debate within the astronomy community. Despite the Voyager probe visiting the planet three decades ago, data collected is still being discussed.

Moscow -
The launch next month of a Soyuz spacecraft carrying three astronauts to the International Space Station has been postponed by 48 hours, Russia's space agency said Friday, reportedly to ensure better docking conditions.

Despite the downgrading of Pluto from a planet (and the ninth in the solar system) to a dwarf planet, much about the far-flung celestial object remains a mystery. A new puzzle involves the presence of clouds.

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Space Image

A solar prominence (loop) erupts from the surface of the sun on 30 March in this false-colour image taken by the Solar Dynamics Observatory. Reds are relatively cool, at about 60,000 °C, while blues and greens are at more than 1 million °C

NASA

When Chris Hadfield uses the benchpress, this is his view from the International Space Station

TDRS-K is the first of three next-generation communications satellites designed to ensure vital operational continuity for NASA

NASA

Tiangong-1

China.org

The large Whirlpool Galaxy (left) is known for its sharply defined spiral arms. Their prominence could be the result of the Whirlpool's gravitational tug-of-war with its smaller companion galaxy (right).

NASA/ESO/STI

A close-up view of the sun via NASA's Solar Dynamics Observatory. A prominence eruption on the sun: an arc of gas can loop hundreds of thousands of kilometres into space, held for months by strong magnetic fields

NASA

Location of supervoid or Cold Spot

NASA

DonkeyHotey

Nearly 200,000 light-years from Earth, the Large Magellanic Cloud, a satellite galaxy of the Milky Way, floats in space, in a long and slow dance around our galaxy.

Snow-covered deserts are rare, but that’s exactly what the Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) on NASA’s Aqua satellite observed as it passed over the Taklimakan Desert in western China on Jan. 2, 2013.

This new view of the historical supernova remnant Cassiopeia A, located 11,000 light-years away, was taken by NASA's Nuclear Spectroscopic Telescope Array, or NuSTAR. Blue indicates the highest energy X-ray light, where NuSTAR has made the first resolved image ever of this source

NASA

The extreme ultraviolet light emitted by ionised helium on the sun indicates a temperature near 80,000 degrees Celsius